Mr Handel from Cobham contacted the Club to ask what proportion of runs he and his peers have made in 6s. In some rare down-time over the Christmas period we’ve now managed to put a couple of things together that we hope answers his query.

Of the players that played in 2018, here are the percentages of their career runs for the Club in sixes. To make this list you must have hit a minimum of eight career sixes and scored a minimum of 150 runs for the Club:

Looking at the wider list of all Stoke players, here are some notable others – some familiar names appear near the top; three of them would have made the top of the above list.

The 2018 list has eleven players who have scored more than 10% of their runs in sixes; so this is the additional qualification for the all-time list below, (in addition to the same minimum 8×6/minimum 150 career runs that is in use); six people have hit more than a quarter of their career runs in 6s:

A couple of disclaimers, though : Play Cricket only carries strike rates where the number of balls faced are entered on to a scorecard, and the system applies that as an overall career strike rate; so in the old days when this wasn’t such a well-kept stat in scorebooks, sometimes players only had a ‘balls faced’ entered where it could be worked out that they were out in, say, the early overs of a match, or we could see they were dismissed early when it could be seen in the scorebook that wickets fell in quick succession.

Two players to suffer from this glitch are Dave Willis and Ian Lipscombe who certainly would not have accumulated the runs they did for the club at strike rates of less than 15 runs per 100 balls! (Sorry, boys!)

Adrian Black and Ollie Hood have no scorecards with balls faced against their names so appear at the bottom of the list. Adrian’s numbers would have been interesting as he had the potential to score his runs quickly, although he was also very patient when the match situation dictated; so we are confident that the Navid, Timmy and Frank are the only three. (The biggest beneficiary of the glitch is Neal Heaton who has a recorded strike rate of 475.00!)

Some more realistic numbers for players who have some amazing strike rates in shorter careers are Jeremy Beckwith who took time out from umpiring our Saturday 1st XI matches to bludgeon his Sunday runs for us at 215.00 runs per 100 balls; Greg Routley, (1443 runs / 131.69 strike rate – inc 84 sixes), Johnny Lawes, (1774 / 128.90), Andy Berry, (1030 / 102.53) and Roger Bowman, (1023 / 140.00), have all scored more than 1000 runs at better than a run-a-ball.

Jerry Hinds, (150.98), and Anthony Alleyne, (139.86), are two others who scored very quickly in a handful of competitive games; and in his one season so far Shawn Dyson has scored his runs at 113.97. Ed Ashwell currently has a career strike rate of 125.56.

Stoke representation at the Melbourne Test in the form of Hayden Routley, (son of one of our all-time leading six-hitters Greg), who was playing “Milo Cricket” on the outfield at the interval. (http://playcricket.com.au/learn/in2cricket)

A reminder that Hayden was born in the UK, so he’s ours if he shows any signs of emulating Alastair Cook’s efforts!

In last week’s “Ask Steven” section on CricInfo“Irfan” from Pakistan asked:

I noticed that Ajit Agarkar has a Test batting average of 16.79 despite having a century to his name. Is this the lowest Test batting average to include a century?

Steven replied:

The Indian fast bowler turned Cricinfo pundit Ajit Agarkar might be relieved to learn that he comes in quite a way down this particular list. Agarkar’s hundred came at Lord’s, no less, in 2002; his next highest score was 48. There are eight players with lower batting averages who also scored a Test century, one of them a current player, the Zimbabwe captain Graeme Cremer, (16.27.)

Top of the list is someone who might also yet reappear in Test cricket. The West Indian fast bowler Jerome Taylor averages only 12.96 despite having slammed 106 against New Zealand in Dunedin in 2008-09. Taylor’s 106 that day is exactly double his next highest score.

In a bored moment this got SDCC thinking and we looked at all our centurions, (now up to 81 after Alastair Curran, Ishan Mulchandani and Reino Grobler got themselves on our hundreds board this year – http://www.stokecc.co.uk/centuries/), to see how we compared.

In fairness to our boys, though, we only play single innings cricket and are more likely to damage our averages in the pursuit of quick runs towards the end of an innings; plus some others have also made a number of low scores as juniors when making their first steps into adult cricket; so we’ll compare our stats against the International ODI list rather than the Test list in the ‘Ask Steven’ feature. (We can’t do a T20 comparison as no Stoker has made a century in T20 cricket yet!)

The full list of 81 Stokers with a century to their name, (the eighteen players who played in 2017 are highlighted), and their career averages can be viewed here :

Career Averages for All Stoke Centurions to the end of the 2017 seasonRead more

Club Secretary Phippsy lets talks us know his Greatest Stoke XI since joining us in 2008…

1. Jack Raimondo
I had the pleasure of batting with Jack on a few occasions, not very long mind you, and then watching him when umpiring. Very talented and great skills. Seen him really determined. OK it was in a 2s game last season away at Chertsey, but he was class. (This commentary provided before the recent game at Sinjuns.)

SDCC : What a What a win! Did you chase them down with overs to spare?

GR : Had to chase them down in 31. So a couple of overs to spare. The opponents needed an outright win to make the finals. Finally a win with the new club!

SDCC : Sounded like a good game – other Stokers who have played in these 2-dayers say things can get farcical on the second day if the first innings lead is secured and there is no prospect of a result. Were your runs all in boundaries?

GR : Pretty much. The 4 in the first innings was just a boundary and, the 8 in second included a six on to the railway!!! Sound familiar? Got a finish after a big opening stand in the second innings!

Finding it hard to get used to the turf pitchers over here. Not as quick. The ball seems to hold the in wicket a lot more than in the UK. I can see why Jase developed a good cut shot! Need to work on that as the bowling is all pretty short.

SDCC : Nice that you’ve found a railway to target like you had at Stoke!

GR : It was at the opposition ground so couldn’t help myself. No sightscreens at the ground either so very different. Bizarre to bat twice in one day too!!!

SDCC : We saw that. There was some cruel suggestion that you were sent in as a nightwatchman last week…though we couldn’t think of a less suitable candidate for the role!

GR : No, they were trying to hide me but the top order fell to pieces in the first innings.

SDCC : Back to Stoke, we presume saw that despite being right up there in the all-time six hitting list, (see graphic below), you still haven’t made Dom Morley’s Greatest XI…but you made the squad…and Jase is now a Pom?

GR : Saw I made the squads but not the final eleven. Yep, saw Jase got the Pom nationalisation too…as long as he is making and taking them for Stoke mate all for the greater good I reckon. I’ll send a Greatest Stoke – I’ll do one of the guys I played with – by the end of the week mate.

Stay tuned to see what Greg comes up with, folks. Meantime, here is the list of all-time leading six-hitter for the Club!!!

With a cold snap in the UK, here is a round-up of how some Stokers are currently getting on in warmer climates…

WEST INDIES
Anthony was back in domestic action yesterday, hitting a quick 20 in an opening stand that helped Barbados set up a formidable 50-over total of 302 against Guyana, who – without Shiv Chanderpaul selected in their XI – were well beaten.

Anthony keeps good company these days. The other ten members of the Barbados XI have all played for the West Indies; eight of the ten have played Tests – including current captain Jason Holder – the other two have played ODIs and T20Is leaving Anthony, (U19 World Cup appearances only), as the only uncapped player.

“Very different back here…a lot more short bowling and not a lot of half-volleys.”

That’s the verdict from Greg Routley having recently returned to competitive action following a brief sabbatical from the game. Turning out for the Hallam Kalora Park Cricket Club, here are his matches so far:

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